slowing down

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this morning…

This morning I was sitting in my car at a red light on Alameda St, here in Santa Fe, NM. Two young adults, a man and a woman, walking on the sidewalk engaged in animated conversation, caught my eye. The woman, short and thin, wearing dreadlocks and a long skirt, was draped in a gray, black and white woven blanket – the kind one finds in Mexico. The man, quite tall and thin, probably wearing dreadlocks under the bulky hat on his head, was carrying a large red backpack and a sleeping bag stuffed in an orange stuff sack. As I was taking in this scene I was wondering why I had noticed these two, and then I realized that I recognized the Mexican blanket, the big red backpack and the sleeping bag stuffed in the orange stuff sack… these were items that just a week or two ago I had donated to Need and Deed, a non-profit org here in town that provides services to the homeless.

My heart filled with gratitude and my eyes filled with tears. And as I was feeling all of this in my heart and my eyes, my mind was joining in with thoughts of stopping my car and engaging with them, letting them know how happy I was to see them using these items that I no longer needed. My heart suggested that I did not need to do anything! My heart encouraged me to embrace this moment and send love to these two young homeless people who appeared completely content as they walked their path…

Then I pulled into a park to call my sister before returning to my studio where I have no cell service. As I parked and turned off the car, I saw before me a work of art… I saw magic! Someone (or someones) had meticulously placed the fallen pinecones under the pine trees in lines on the ground, connecting the trees, and then within the lines, they had created spirals and circles.

My heart filled with gratitude and my eyes filled with tears. I thought about the person/people who had chosen to take the time to place these pinecones. In this park I have seen groups of children playing, people walking their dogs, people sitting at the picnic tables…My mind seemed to want to figure out who had engaged with the pinecones, and my heart encouraged me to let go of the thinking, embrace this moment, and just send love to whomever created this magical moment that I had the honor to witness.